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Dessert

Peppermint Stick

A candied sugar confection flavored with peppermint oil.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Sugar and cream are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 43,450 recipes. Both carry 2,3-butanedione, which smells butter, sweet. The science ↓

Peppermint Stick

Ingredients

Directions

Make the sugar base

  1. Combine sugar and water in a large pot and stir until dissolved.

  2. Add cream of tartar. If using glucose, hollow out a space in the sugar and pour in the glucose.

  3. Place the pot on the steamer until the mixture begins to cook.

  4. Remove any sugar grains from the sides with a damp sponge or cloth.

  5. Cook until the sugar just starts to turn yellow or reaches 330°F (165°C).

Divide and color

  1. Pour the mixture onto a greased slab.

  2. Fold the edges of the batch together.

  3. Take about 2 pounds of the hot batch, add red food coloring, and work it in.

  4. Place the batch on a spinning table to keep warm.

Flavor and form

  1. Flavor the remaining batch with peppermint oil and pull until perfectly white.

  2. Form the mixture into a roll and use the red piece to create a wide strip to place across the batch.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

  2. Cream + pepperminttop 20% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together632 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  3. Sugar + pepperminttop 29% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together2,082 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Sugar
Forms the main structure of the candy as it cooks and hardens into a glassy texture.
Cream of tartar
Acid that helps prevent sugar from crystallizing, keeping the candy smooth.
Glucose
Interferes with sugar crystal formation, helping the candy stay smooth and pliable.

The step that matters

Cook to the target temperature. Sugar syrup must reach the correct temperature to set into a firm but workable candy. Undercooking leaves it sticky, while overcooking makes it brittle and prone to browning.

Swap the peppermint

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, cream):

  1. Nutmegfits better
  2. Cinnamonfits better
  3. Gingerfits about as well
  4. Peppermintthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, cream. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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